Thinking is an excellent distraction from feeling

So, ironically I was 'thinking' about this last week. The idea that 'thinking is an excellent distraction from feeling'.

I can't remember what prompted it, but I was probably in the shower or walking the dog (where I get my best thoughts and ideas).

Anyway, I know I was feeling a bit overwhelmed and irritated, bordering on angry, and as I was walking I was rationalising why I was feeling like this. Asking myself 'Why am I feeling so angry? I've got nothing to be angry about. Everything is fine' Which was super unhelpful because then I started feeling guilty and bad about myself for feeling angry!

So instead of 'thinking' about how I was feeling, I decided to go all in and 'feel' it instead.

It wasn't pretty.

I could feel heat in my chest.

My heart was beating faster.

I stretched my body.

I felt a bit sick.

And then the tears came (like ugly crying tears with lots of exhales).

Within 5 minutes I felt lighter, more settled and could even laugh at myself.

I processed the emotions without thinking about them.

I allowed them to move through my body.

Emotions are 'energy in motion'. They are meant to move.

When we start analysing how we feel and go up into our heads and away from our bodies we loose connection with ourselves. The emotions stay stuck in our bodies and fester. That's why we end up with tension, pain and tightness in our bodies. And so we keep going round in circles in our thoughts too - trying to figure out what is going on.

And I understand why we do this. It's uncomfortable to feel some our feelings. We don't always want to go there. Thinking is an excellent distraction from feeling.

That used to be me. I was great at 'talking about' my feelings without actually feeling them. I could narrate my stories of loss and sadness and feel nothing. From the outside it looked like I really had my shit together, but we can't outthink our feelings. They will still be there. In our bodies. Waiting to be felt and expressed.

I'm sharing this with you, because if you too are a 'thinker' rather than a 'feeler' then it can make for living a 'half-arsed life'. Sorry, I can't think of another way to put it. Life is here to be experienced, to be felt and lived. To feel the highs and lows, the boredom, the disappointment, the relief, the joy, the loss. This is how we know we are alive and not a walking corpse!